Save As: NextGen Heritage Conservation
Episodes
The Sublime: Art and Heritage Conservation at Industrial Sites
31 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
What does “sublime” mean to you? Join us for an art history-meets-heritage conservation episode with recent graduate Ryan Holcomb. Like many of ou...
Community Land Trusts as a Tool for Rural Housing Preservation
29 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Recent graduate Andrea Mauk is from the historic mining town of Clifton, Arizona, just a few miles from the largest copper mine in the United States. ...
[Encore] A Tale of Two Rivers: Los Angeles and San Antonio
03 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On December 5, USC hosts the Soak It Up conference, exploring "landscape architecture’s leadership role in addressing critical urban flooding a...
[ENCORE] After the War: Using Heritage to Rebuild
13 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Much has changed since we spoke with alumna Dalia Mokayed in 2020 about her thesis, Heritage Conservation to Rebuild Cities After Crisis. Yet wars wor...
[Encore] Conserving L.A.'s Queer Eden(dale)
09 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
"A city is composed of different types of men; similar people cannot bring the city into existence." This quote from Aristotle's Politi...
Save As: Fall 2025
25 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Save As is taking a brief break, but we'll bring you some gems from the archives and launch Season 6 before the end of the year. In the meantime...
For the Record: Reclaiming Women’s History
03 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Of the more than 1,300 local landmarks in the City of Los Angeles, less than three percent—that’s right, three—reference the history or contribu...
Using AI to Reclaim and Preserve APIA Heritage
22 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
As artificial intelligence (AI) transforms modern life, we’re understanding more about the benefits and tradeoffs of its use in generating content. ...
[Encore] Architecture + Advocacy in L.A.'s Sugar Hill
24 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
An Encore episode with a new update!A group of architecture students at the University of Southern California wants to do more than just design buildi...
Framing History through Photography
03 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Photographer Sally Mann once said, “Photographs open doors to the past, but also allow a look into the future.” Photography is a key component of ...
Sharing Hidden History, from Place to Policy
06 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In this “Where Are They Now?” episode, we catch up with Elysha Paluszek (MHC ‘10), senior associate, architectural historian, and preservation p...
After the Fires: What Remains
13 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A month after the disastrous fires in the Los Angeles area, this special episode features a conversation among Save As co-hosts Trudi Sandmeier and Ci...
Everyday Urbanism in L.A.’s Koreatown
12 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this “Where Are They Now?” episode, we catch up with alum Junyoung Myung (MHC ’15), who followed yet another of many career paths in heritage...
How Lesbian Bars Built Community in San Francisco’s North Beach
21 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
As a young architectural historian in San Francisco, Shayne Watson would take lunchtime walks near her office, pondering how and where the city’s le...
[Encore] Free to be Punjabi
31 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
October 31st marks the beginning of Diwali, the Hindu Festival of Lights. It's the most important holiday in India. In celebration, we are re-rel...
Death Valley Ghost Town: Conservation of the Ryan Mining District
10 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Before Death Valley became a desert tourism mecca, it was a mining hot spot. The homelands of the Timbisha Shoshone tribe were opened to industry duri...
Preserving Black Heritage in the U.S. South
19 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
One of the signs memorializing the 1955 murder of Emmett Till weighs nearly 500 pounds and is designed to absorb a rifle round. It’s the fourth vers...
A Tale of Two Rivers: Los Angeles and San Antonio
30 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Why do urban rivers look like they do? What makes one river key to a city’s identity and another one largely unknowable? We wrap up Season Four with...
Beyond the Stage: Uncovering Drag Culture in Los Angeles
09 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Drag performances have long been a draw for audiences in L.A., though often held “underground” because of threats of persecution. In addition to i...
There's an App for That: 3D Scanning with a Smartphone
18 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Tools for documenting historic buildings evolve constantly, but professional 3D scanners remain out of reach for most of us. Alumna Ye Hong, our first...
Documenting Black Women’s History at the Wilfandel Clubhouse
28 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Dedicated students at the University of Southern California have pulled out the laser scanners and measuring tapes to document the Wilfandel Clubhouse...
The Midcentury Spa-Tels of Desert Hot Springs
07 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
New alumna (and Save As producer) Willa Seidenberg has enjoyed the mineral-water spas of Desert Hot Springs for decades. In the 1950s, the Coachella V...
The Hidden Heritage of San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf
15 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A San Francisco native, alumna Emi Takahara always wondered why so many locals dismiss the historic Fisherman’s Wharf as a tourist trap. Sure, it ha...
Rehabbing Old Houses into Affordable Housing
25 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Alumna Isabel Thornton grew up in the Rust Belt town of Roanoke, Virginia. After graduating from USC, she eventually returned home and took note of th...
[Update] Meet You at Lenchita's
14 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Alumna Sara Delgadillo grew up in Pacoima, a blue-collar neighborhood in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley. Sara joined us in Season One to discuss how gro...
[Update] Heritage and Hope at the Mafundi Building in Watts
02 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
After the Watts Rebellion of 1965, Black architects Art Silvers and Robert Kennard designed a Late Modern building for the Mafundi Institute, a cultur...
[Update] Bunker Hill Refrain: Resurrecting a Lost Community
12 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
From 1930s census cards to virtual reality, the Bunker Hill Refrain project just keeps getting cooler. This multi-year effort is using data to reimagi...
Save As: Fall 2023!
05 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Save As is taking a wee little break this fall. BUT we will bring you some exciting updates on previous episodes. We will be back in 2024 better t...
Architecture + Advocacy in L.A.'s Sugar Hill
21 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A group of architecture students at the University of Southern California wants to do more than just design buildings. They want to work with communit...
Valuing the Vernacular in Beaufort, SC
01 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When Emily Varley arrived in Beaufort, SC for a summer internship, she had no idea she’d make a discovery that would change the course of her studie...
Allensworth: The Past and Future of a Black Agrarian Utopia
11 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Allensworth is a tiny town with a big history—and its residents are grappling with some very big issues. The only town in California founded and gov...
Mysteries of Modernism at Schindler’s Buck House
20 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
One of the many great things about Los Angeles is its unrivaled legacy of modern residential architecture. Students in Peyton Hall's Materials Co...
[Encore] After the War: Using Heritage to Rebuild
30 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In case you missed it, we're re-releasing this episode from Season 1.The decade-long civil war in Syria has decimated the country’s infrastruct...
Legacy Businesses in Immigrant Neighborhoods
09 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Small businesses provide much more than goods and services. Over time, they become neighborhood anchors and a key source of culture and community—es...
Reinvesting in a Rosenwald School
16 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when a community takes its educational future into its own hands? Funded by local advocates and a generous grant from the Rosenwald Fund,...
Bearing Witness: World War II "Comfort Women" Stations
26 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Warning: This episode features the difficult topic of sexual slavery during World War II. Producer Willa Seidenberg talks with recent graduate Hanyu C...
[ENCORE] Preserving That Signature Sound
05 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In case you missed it, we're re-releasing an episode from our first season, chosen by our Save As intern, Emily Kwok. It's an Emily's P...
[ENCORE] Fictional History: Recognizing TV and Film Locations
22 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In case you missed it, we're re-releasing an episode from last season, chosen by our Save As intern, Emily Kwok. It's an Emily's Pick! ...
Is Deconstruction a Dirty Word?
01 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
How can taking a building apart possibly relate to heritage conservation? Join us in the Upside Down for a chat with architect and alum Guadalupe Flor...
The Postwar L.A. of Gin Wong
10 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Chinese American architect Gin D. Wong, FAIA (1922-2017) defined what it means to achieve the American dream. He immigrated from China as a boy and we...
Feng Shui as Cultural Heritage
20 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This episode delves into global heritage conservation, as producer Willa Seidenberg talks with recent grad Haowen Yu about his thesis, Examining Feng ...
Surf, Sand, and Self-Determination: Jim Crow-Era Leisure for Black Angelenos
29 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We said “so long” to summer with a trip to the Santa Monica beach with historian Alison Rose Jefferson, whose work at USC launched a deep dive int...
Trailer
20 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
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Every Fixture Tells a Story: Neutra’s Reunion House
02 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
When is a light fixture not just a light fixture? When it helps tell the story of a remarkable home designed, and lived in, by one of the twentieth ce...
Is Leimert Park L.A.'s Most Significant Neighborhood?
18 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Is Leimert Park the most significant neighborhood in Los Angeles? Katie Horak thinks it might be. “I don't think there's any neighborhood ...
Boots on the Ground: Archaeology and Community at Manzanar
05 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Last month, about ninety volunteers spent a weekend excavating the former hospital site at Manzanar, a World War II incarceration camp about 225 miles...
Tabula Raza: A New Table for People-Centered Conservation
21 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As a kid, Laura Dominguez would sit under the kitchen table during tamale season, listening to family stories as the grownups handed her corn husks to...
Disco and Diversity in Armenian L.A.
07 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
You may know that Greater Los Angeles has the largest Armenian population outside of Armenia. But you might think it’s concentrated in the city of G...
Robert Kennard, Architect for Humanity
17 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Robert A. Kennard, FAIA (1920 - 1995) led an extraordinary life as an architect, mentor, and humanitarian. The son of a Pullman car porter, Kennard de...
Beit Olam: The Forever Homes of East L.A.’s Jewish Cemeteries
03 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Cemeteries mean many things to many people. In this episode, we talk with alum Rachel Trombetta about her thesis, Beit Olam: A Home Everlasting--The J...
Help! Take Our 3-Minute Survey
22 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We need to hear from you! Please take 180 seconds to let us know what you think about Save As:Click here to take the Save As surveyIt means so much to...
Beyond the Fog: San Francisco’s Clement Street
17 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
San Francisco is a preservation-minded city, but as we hear in this episode, not all parts of the city get the same amount of preservation love. Alum ...
Conservation “On the Natch” at the Alcoholism Center for Women
03 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
At the Alcoholism Center for Women (ACW), women regain their lives and claim their space in the world. They also take care of two century-old homes in...
Quantity and Quality: Modernism and More
20 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this grab bag of SoCal history, we talk with alum Sian Winship, an architectural historian with her fingers in many, many pies. She explored the w...
Community-Led Advocacy: Saving Places and Building Power
16 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
When M. Rosalind Sagara entered the world of heritage conservation, she brought along a deep passion for, and background in, community organizing. At ...
Culture, Community, and the Holiday Bowl
02 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In 2003, the majority of the beloved Holiday Bowl in L.A.’s Crenshaw district was demolished. Although the bowling alley--a big box profoundly impor...
Oakwood and the "Racing of Space" in Venice
18 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
At the turn of the last century, Black entrepreneur Arthur L. Reese convinced developer Abbot Kinney to hire Black workers for Kinney’s seaside reso...
Fictional History: Recognizing Film and TV Locations
04 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Should the Brady Bunch House be in the National Register of Historic Places? Why not? asks alum Jonathan Kaplan. In his master’s thesis, the TV writ...
Old Pasadena's Act Two
21 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As a teenager, Ingrid Peña saw a struggling part of Pasadena morph into the poster child for the revival of historic business districts in Southern C...
Yettem: A Garden of Eden in Armenian California
07 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
How do you preserve the heritage of a place you have to leave? Find out from Ani Mnatsakanyan, who just finished her master’s thesis on the Central ...
These Walls CAN Talk: Heritage and Hope at the Mafundi Building in Watts
13 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As L.A.’s Watts neighborhood reeled from the 1965 Rebellion against systemic injustice, Black architects and civil rights activists Art Silvers and ...
Bunker Hill Refrain: Resurrecting a Lost Community
29 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Bunker Hill looms large in the collective memory of Los Angeles. Once a tony enclave of Victorian homes, the downtown neighborhood became a vibrant an...
Meet you at Lenchita's
15 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Alumna Sara Delgadillo grew up in the working class ethnic enclave of Pacoima in the San Fernando Valley. The heart of the community, the Van Nuys Bou...
Free to be Punjabi
01 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The allure of abundant work and fertile soil drew many to California, and in particular, the rich rural areas of the state. Punjabi workers came in sm...
From Boom to Bust – L.A.’s Public Housing Legacy
18 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In mid-century Los Angeles, public housing was designed to house the many workers flooding to the city seeking jobs in the booming industrial economy....
After the War: Using Heritage to Rebuild
04 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The decade-long civil war in Syria has decimated the country’s infrastructure, killed more than 400,000 Syrians, and created the world’s largest d...
Hometown Heritage in Compton
18 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
What comes to mind when you think of Compton? If it’s gangs and rap, think again. This small city is one of the oldest in L.A. County, with a histor...
The Rancho Roots of Mission Viejo
04 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
How did a 1960s master-planned suburb use its century-old rancho heritage to form a new vernacular? The story of Mission Viejo spans so many issues--t...
Sisterhood Is Beautiful
21 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In 1974, Brenda Weathers came across a century-old home in Pico-Union, an early Los Angeles neighborhood that had seen better days. She decided to use...
Building Resilient Communities Through Conservation
07 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Pandemics, climate change, natural disasters, inequity, the perils of urbanization: cities worldwide are working to build resilience against these and...
Heritage and Homelessness
24 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How can heritage conservation help end homelessness? USC grad students in heritage conservation, architecture, and urban planning sought to find out. ...
Conserving L.A.'s Queer Eden(dale)
10 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Los Angeles has a rich LGBTQ heritage that's been largely hidden. Recent graduate Rafael Fontes talks with producer Willa Seidenberg about why si...
Preserving That Signature Sound
26 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever considered sound a character-defining feature? Musician and recent USC grad Kasey Viso Conley certainly has. She knows why Nat King Cole...
Traces of Violence in the City of Angels
12 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In this year of racial reckoning, our first Save As interview explores sites of violence against people of color."Lurking beneath empty lots, non...
A Glimpse into the Future
29 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Racial violence. Urban resilience. Acoustic heritage. Heritage conservation students at the University of Southern California are tackling some of the...